A brief note on Peter Ludlow’s denial of sexual assault allegations

Peter Ludlow has, via his lawyer, released a denial of sexual assault allegations made by a student at Northwestern. It is worth noting that there is no denial that he was at an art event with this student, or that she ended up at his house that night. Even if the sexual assault allegations are false, such socializing with students (if it happened) is still highly questionable. This kind of thing (whether or not Ludlow did do such a thing) happens far too often, and is a manifestation of a power imbalance in our profession which really must be addressed — not just for the sake of gender equality but for the sake of preventing philosophy from becoming even more of the intellectual ghetto it has become.